WP 2. The Nordic Societal Security Academy (NSSA)

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NSSA is the main educational and researcher mobility vehicle of NORDRESS, which will provide mobility grants and fund courses or seminars for graduate students, policy makers, rescue workers, media, and others. It will be lead by the NORDRESS executive team and project manager and be based at the Institute for Sustainability Studies, University of Iceland.

Researcher mobility is of central importance to strengthen relations and cooperation between researcher groups. All the research teams in NORDRESS are multinational, and all the tasks will be carried out in two or more Nordic countries. This calls for researcher mobility in all the teams, albeit to a varying degree. The main support for researcher mobility in NORDRESS will be provided through the NSSA.

NSSA will on average supply 10 mobility grants per year to fund travel costs of team members on working missions or visiting host institution to use special facilities there or carry out a part of their project. Mobility grants can also be provided for experts outside the NORDRESS consortium such as international specialists on work visits.

Team leaders may submit mobility grant applications to the NSSA executive board three times pear year (Jan 31, May 31, Sept 30). Applications should include information on the planned activities and how they relate to a particular WP.

The NSSA also co-funds courses/seminars on subjects relevant for societal security that academics, institutions, NGOs or other relevant agents offer.

The NSSA will be organized as a network of Nordic universities and other agents actively engaged in research, education and training in the field of societal security. The backbone will be the NORDRESS consortium, which will draw on its wide contacts nationally and internationally and invite all interested to take part in the activities of the NSSA. In order to strengthen the research environment in the neighboring regions, care will be taken to invite relevant institutions in the Baltic countries to join the NSSA. Particular emphasis will be placed on making use of existing national and international networks, both in Nordic and European contexts. Thus the NSSA network will be far wider than the NORDRESS consortium.

NSSA will fund up to 3 courses/seminars per year (15 in all), based on applications from competent network partners who wish to organize and host a course. NSSA will co-fund the cost of travel and board for participants/speakers and contribute towards the salaries of invited international experts.

Each course will involve participants from at least three Nordic countries.

The NORDRESS Executive board evaluates applications twice a year, selects courses/seminars to be funded and monitors quality. The organizers provide the course venue and manage the course in every respect. The courses/seminars are typically 3-5 days but may vary in length. To facilitate accreditation by different universities, where applicable, the workload of the course will be measured in internationally recognized work-units, ECTS.

The courses will serve researchers, not least doctoral students in the Nordic and neighboring countries, but can also target others concerned with safety, such as government officials, policy makers, disaster management teams, and media people.

Through the NSSA, NORDRESS will be able to provide a wide selection of courses/seminars relevant to societal security for different groups of stakeholders, by encouraging and enabling the best Nordic experts to organize and host such events.